Preparation and characterization of highly conductive lignin aerogel based on tunicate nanocellulose framework
Weijie Lin, Shuai Wu, Shibo Han, Jie Xie, Hongshen He, Qiuxia Zou, Dezhong Xu, Dengwen Ning, Ajoy Kanti Mondal, Fang Huang
Abstract
The highly conductive and elastic three-dimensional mesh porous material is an ideal platform for the fabrication of high electrical conductivity conductive aerogels . Herein, a multifunctional aerogel that is lightweight, highly conductive and stable sensing properties is reported. Tunicate nanocellulose (TCNCs) with a high aspect ratio, high Young's modulus , high crystallinity, good biocompatibility and biodegradability was used as the basic skeleton to prepare aerogel by freeze-drying technique. Alkali lignin (AL) was used as the raw material, polyethylene glycol diglycidyl ether (PEGDGE) was used as the cross-linking agent, and polyaniline (PANI) was used as the conductive polymer. Preparation of aerogels by freeze-drying technique, in situ synthesis of PANI, and construction of highly conductive aerogel from lignin/TCNCs. The structure, morphology and crystallinity of the aerogel were characterized by FT-IR, SEM, and XRD . The results show that the aerogel has good conductivity (as high as 5.41 S/m) and excellent sensing performance. When the aerogel was assembled as a supercapacitor , the maximum specific capacitance can reach 772 mF/cm 2 at 1 mA/cm 2 current density, and maximum power and energy density can reach 59.4 μWh/cm 2 and 3600 μW/cm 2 , respectively. It is expected the aerogel can be applied in the field of wearable devices and electronic skin.